Page:History of the Radical Party in Parliament.djvu/422

 4oS History of the Radical Party in Parliament. [1850- like heroes in these engagements were dying in the trenches without medical stores, almost without food, and entirely with- out proper clothing or provisions for shelter. Such a winter as was passed by our troops in those fatal trenches has not often been heard of. The accounts came over to this country slowly, and when the winter session was opened on the I2th of December, the excitement on the subject was only com- mencing. The time before Christmas was occupied in passing votes of thanks to our own forces and to the French com- manders, and in enacting a Foreigners' Enlistment Bill to raise a force of not exceeding 15,000 foreigners to be drilled in this country. On the 23rd the House adjourned for the Christmas holidays. Before Parliament met again, the bad news from the Crimea had become known, and " the public sympathy and indignation were roused to the utmost by the conviction that the soldiers of the finest army Great Britain had ever sent forth were ingloriously perishing of disease, overtasked, and underfed, from the absence of the most ordinary calculation and fore- sight." * On the 23rd of January, 1855, when Parliament again assembled, the popular feeling found expression in notices of motion given in both Houses, the most important one being that by Roebuck, for a select committee to inquire into the administration of the war. This, which would have been formidable in any case, was rendered doubly so now by the action of the leader of the House of Commons. On the 25th January, when Roebuck's motion was to be discussed, Lord John rose and announced his resignation, which he had tendered because he did not see on what grounds the proposed inquiry could be resisted ; but, as it impugned the conduct of some of his colleagues, if he could not oppose it on their behalf, he was bound to resign. If there had been any doubt before as to the result of the decision on the motion, it was now at an end ; the resolution was accepted as a vote of want of confidence in the Government, and there was only the remnant of a Government left to confide in. On the 26th Roebuck
 * " Annual Register," 1855, p. 2.